Norwegian Electric Onroad Champs Rd4 – Report
The fourth round of the Norwegian Electric Onroad Championships was held in Gjøvik on a permanent track facility in the centre of the city. The event had 45 entries in total, divided in four classes with the main classes being 1/10 Touring Car Modified and 1/12th pan car. In the opening round of qualifying reigning Nordic Champion Nikolai Håheim and ETS A-finalist Helge Johannessen opened up the first laps swapping the lead, but after 5 laps Nikolai started to build up a 1.5 seconds gap which he held throughout the round. Nikolai took the overall TQ ahead of Helge in 2nd, followed by an impressive 3rd place for Rune Svestøl. Petter Bernsten, in a fight with Nikolai for the overall championship, would see himself struggling throughout the whole qualifying, as he felt uncomfortable the whole weekend with the track that he felt was too “technical for his driving style”.
Qualifying results:
1. Nikolai Håheim – Schumacher
2. Helge Johannessen – ARC
3. Rune Svestøl – Xray
4. Petter Berntsen – VBC
5. Georg Ellingsen – Xray
6. Roger Berntsen – VBC
7. Lars Andersen – ARC
8. Sebastian Huse – Team Associated
9. Alexander Nygaard – Xray
In A1, Nikolai went on to take a tone to tone win, ending the race almost a lap in front of 2nd place driver Helge Johannessen. Petter Bernsten, who was unlucky at the start, dropped to the last place early in the final but with a great recovery and some great overtaking manoeuvres he came in 3rd followed by Georg in 4th and Rune in 5th.
A2 started off good for Nikolai, but after one lap he rolled his car which put him down to 3rd behind Helge and Petter. Nikolai made a quick recovery and was able to put pressure on Petter who made a small mistake which let Nikolai through. Nikolai quickly caught up with Helge who did not have the same pace compared to Nikolai. Helge made a mistake which let Nikolai through into the lead. Nikolai ultimately won leg 2 in front of Petter Bernsten who came in 5 seconds behind. Therefore Nikolai would take the overall win early and Georg once again improved from his grid position and made an impressive 3rd place with Rune in 4th. Down the field Helge had to retire with a broken car halfway through the final.
In A3 Nikolai once again made a great start building up a gap to the rest, but after a big mistake, he ended up getting stuck with a border. This let Rune and Petter by who were now in a fight for the final podium spot. Rune so far was in front of Petter and Nikolai and the latter was set to win all finals and started pushing to catch up with Petter. He found his way past, but now Rune had a comfortable lead. Rune drove smart and consistent, and won the last leg in front of Nikolai who did not have enough time left on the clock to try to make his way past Rune. Petter came in 3rd to take the last spot on the podium behind Rune in 2nd and Nikolai in 1st.
Touring Car Modified top 9 result:
1. Nikolai Håheim – Schumacher
2. Rune Svestøl – Xray
3. Petter Bernsten – VBC
4. Helge Johannessen – ARC
5. Georg Ellingsen – Xray
6. Roger Berntsen – VBC
7. Sebastian Huse – Team Associated
8. Lars Andersen – ARC
9. Alexander Nygaard – Xray
In 1/12th pan car Helge (Team Associated) took a convincing TQ ahead of Lars Haugen (Team Associated) and Trygve Berntsen (Xray) in 3rd. In A1 Lars Haugen took the win in front of Helge in 2nd and Trygve in 3rd while in the second A-final Helge took the win in front Lars in 2nd and this meant the decision would be made in the third and decisive final. Unfortunately Lars had an accident in the warm-up ahead of the leg and broke the rear wheel on his car which he tried to fix before the start but the countdown had already started, which meant that he had to run onto the driver stand. Unfortunately it was seen as disturbing for the drivers which gave him a penalty to start from the back of the pack. This meant that Helge just had to worry about traffic and he could easily cruise to the win in the final leg.
1/12th scale top 3 results:
1. Helge Johannessen – Team Associated
2. Lars Haugen – Team Associated
3. Trygve Berntsen – Xray
Source: Schumacher [racing-cars.com]
